Visibility: 8-10ft, silty with a lot of kelp debris, typical of Otter Cove.

This was a special dive for me, because I grew up spending a lot of time in Pacific Grove and Monterey. My family has a beach house on Asilomar that my great grandfather built in 1948, and I grew up spending many weekends there in my youth. Unfortunately, the annual Triton Open competition was canceled due to forecasted rough swell, but this year, we had vowed to never cancel a dive, and we decided to hit up Coral Street to start our weekend. I went down after work on Friday, and a couple of the dive club members joined me at the house. We went and saw a move and relaxed. I got up around 6 to check the swell in the different dive locations.

Early in the morning, Coral street looked awful, but by the time everyone arrived at 8, the surge actually began to subside. However, we had a particularly large group of 17 guys, made up of many new members, as well as some prospects interested in joining the club. Due to having some divers with us who were a little green, we did not want to risk going into rough waters without knowing their skill levels, so the decision was made to move the crowd to Otter Cove. As the crew departed from Coral Street, 3 other members arrived and chose to stay at Coral street with Kayaks. I bid them good luck and caught up with the bulk of the crew down at Otter Cove.

We all suited up and congregated down at the beach where Alex gave a quick safety talk while people finished their final preparations.

Soon people started trickling into the water. Most of the new divers stayed close to shore diving in around 10-20 feet of water. They came out saying there were a lot of rockfish to be seen. I ventured further northwest toward oceanside with Jason. We hit about 35 feet of water, it was patchy structure with a few fish-heavy sections. I lost a ling and bounced a couple of rockfish off the rocks. ​

We exited the water and everyone unsuited, beer in hand. There was a lot shop talk for a bit, and some of the guys headed home from there.

10 of us headed back to the house for some lunch. Gregg brought a smorgasbord of food as usual to take care of the group.

We sat outside and relaxed on the sand for a few hours, and eventually went down to the beach for a time. By the end of the afternoon, most people were pretty exhausted and one by one, people headed back home. ​

Upcoming, we have our Russian Gulf dive and campout in Mendocino county on May 19th. It is number 2 of the 4 competition dives this year, however many non-comp members are coming to enjoy the swell, the weather, and the company. See you out there. ​​​